


take my word for it (i'm not worth it)

by easystreets



Category: It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia
Genre: Domesticity, Fluff, M/M, Post S-13
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-03
Updated: 2020-09-03
Packaged: 2021-03-06 18:21:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 833
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26263354
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/easystreets/pseuds/easystreets
Summary: Dennis is Icarus, the dumb Greek asshole who flew too close to the sun with wax wings and melted all over Crete. Mac is the idiot who comes to scrape him off the sidewalk, time after time, until there’s nothing left to fix. Dennis is the kicked dog who comes back again and again-- or no, maybe that’s Mac. Maybe they’re scrapyard dogs instead, tearing into each other for the smallest scraps of flesh they can find, sinking their teeth in and expecting to find something other than boiling blood.Or: Dennis is back, this time for good.
Relationships: Mac McDonald/Dennis Reynolds
Comments: 4
Kudos: 39





	take my word for it (i'm not worth it)

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! This is just a quick little snippet of an idea I had.

He wakes up and his back hurts and his plane ticket has spread milky ink all over the pads of his fingers and the window in the living room is open and holy fuck is Philadelphia still the same frigid shithole it always was, and all these minute things fill Dennis up with dirty rage like a county fair balloon so that he almost forgets that he’s home again.

Almost. But then there is silence. No sound but Mac’s snoring and the TV’s soft hum in the background. Dennis’s head falls into his hands and he gathers his breath and does his best to not feel painfully alone. Nobody understands what it’s like, anymore, because no one else has had the guts to leave the Gang and try to be functional and normal. Which he did, for six months, which he tried so hard to be but couldn’t do because some people are born broken and that means Dennis. He’s even worse than the rest of them. At least they know their place. 

Dennis is Icarus, the dumb Greek asshole who flew too close to the sun with wax wings and melted all over Crete. Mac is the idiot who comes to scrape him off the sidewalk, time after time, until there’s nothing left to fix. Dennis is the kicked dog who comes back again and again-- or no, maybe that’s Mac. Maybe they’re scrapyard dogs instead, tearing into each other for the smallest scraps of flesh they can find, sinking their teeth in and expecting to find something other than boiling blood.

Whatever he is, Dennis doesn’t want to be himself. He cracks his wrists and touches his toes. The bathroom’s mirror is one he knows well, down to the splashes of toothpaste coating the bottom half, to the crack in the upper corner from an awry bottle of Axe.

He twists open the door and Mac’s in there. Great. He wanted to have some goddamn privacy; Mac should know that. Mac should shift slightly when Dennis comes in so that Dennis gets the better lighting and can open his makeup drawer, because it’s what they always did so well, but instead he stands and smiles at Dennis through a mouthful of foamy mouthwash. 

“Oh,” Dennis says, unbuttoning his shirt. Maybe Mac will take the hint. “Hey.”

Mac spits-- half of the disgusting Listerine splatters the mirror-- and frowns at him. “You slept in your clothes.”

“Yeah.” Dennis shrugs. In Fargo he did that a lot. And other shit that Mac would’ve never allowed, mostly because there was no Mac standing over him in his shitty long-term motel, telling him that he’d better eat that bowl of steamed broccoli, or that he definitely should be wearing gloves in that weather, if not an entire snowsuit. And now Dennis has permanent numbness in his left index finger and a half-empty bottle of vitamins tucked away in his suitcase and he faints sometimes. It’s a rebellion of sorts, against being loved. “I didn’t know that would be a problem.”

“It’s bad for you, bro.” Mac says, reaching across the counter for his deodorant. “It’s like a whole thing with 24-hour-chemicals, dude, I saw it on YouTube.”

There’s the Mac he missed. “YouTube, huh?” Dennis remarks. He throws his shirt on the floor and quickly shimmies off his pants. Mac always leaves when Dennis is about to shower, always. It’s the one line he surprisingly hasn’t crossed--yet. The water is some sort of holy sacrosanct thing, Dennis thinks, or Mac just doesn’t want to hear Dennis cry and curse people in their shitty short bathtub.

“Yeah, I sent you a bunch of videos.”

“I guess I didn’t get any.” Dennis lies. Sure, he’d missed Mac. And yeah, he’d been the tiniest bit lonely. But talking would have just made it worse. It would’ve reminded him of what wasn’t his. Of what he’d given up. So instead Dennis blocked his phone number and only spoke to Dee on Sundays, when she phoned Mandy and asked for him to be put on. 

“Too bad. Charlie and I wanna make a YouTube channel-- well, we tried, actually, but Frank and Dee wanted to get in on it and make like singing videos and shit so we kinda moved past it-- about like how to run a bar.” 

“Really, huh?” Dennis encourages, mostly because he’s missed Mac’s smile. Okay, maybe he’s missed Mac a lot. Maybe coming back isn’t so bad if their mornings can be meaningless and gentle. 

“Yeah. And we were so excited! Charlie stole us a blowtorch from Rona and everything.” Mac isn’t leaving this time. He’s set up camp on the toilet seat, playing with one of Dennis’s nail files. This is how it’s going to be now. “And then-- did you hear about the Waitress’s new pet cat?”

“No,” Dennis says, hopping into the shower. “Tell me more, Mac. I’ve got a lot to catch up on.”

He does. Dennis is finally home.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm going back to school tomorrow! Slightly terrified. Yay using fic to cope with the daily terrors of the world. 
> 
> Also-- this was just a quick snippet of a larger plot I had. If I wrote more of Dennis coming back, would you read it? Not that I need an audience in order to write something, but I also enjoy connecting with folks through fic. Anyway. Have a lovely day!


End file.
